Torsion Box with Drawers

[David Justice]

I'm making a new bench for my CNC and I wanted to make a Torsion box. Would leaving sides off of 2 sides and adding drawers interfere with the flatness/rigidity?

The box will be 60" x 60" and the grid pieces are 5" high and will be glued and screwed tot he top and bottom. What do you think?

Thanks, David

[Mark Bolton]

Why not just keep them there an inset your drawers from the torsion box members to keep them intact?

[David Justice]

Like a face frame? Is that what you mean? The closest thing I can find online is a Ron Paulk type table, which is what I want, but drawers instead of just empty space between the top and bottom.

[Jim Becker]

"It depends" is the correct answer to your question. Leaving off the side pieces does potentially affect the stability of the torsion box because you don't have those side members to support the edges and help keep things perfectly flat. The compromise might be very shallow drawers (say, for cutter organization) so there is a frame member at least close to the edge to help keep things perfectly flat. However, if you don't really care if it stays perfectly flat, then there would be no issue with doing some drawers as you propose, IMHO.

[David Justice]

I ended up leaving a 34" gap in the middle on 2 sides for shallow drawers ( about 15" deep). I want to have support on all of the corners. It's huge and heavy and I don't have any worries about it sagging or going out of flat due to the gaps I left.